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Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has quietly rolled out an adapted version of his Grok AI chatbot across federal agencies, raising alarms about potential privacy breaches and conflicts of interest. Reuters cited three sources inside DOGE saying the team has been using Grok to sift through and analyze sensitive government data, generating reports and insights at speeds beyond traditional methods. DOGE breaches ethics with the Grok AI move According to the three insiders, DOGE engineers installed custom parameters atop Grok, a chatbot that Musk’s xAI launched in late 2023, to accelerate data review and automate report writing. “They feed it government datasets, ask complex questions, and get instant summaries.” An Insider. Another insider added that DOGE staff had encouraged Department of Homeland Security employees to use Grok for internal analyses despite the tool lacking formal agency approval. What’s unclear is exactly what classified or personally identifiable information has been uploaded into Grok or how heavily it has been trained on federal records. If sensitive material were included, the practice could run afoul of federal privacy statutes and conflict-of-interest rules. Five ethics and technology experts warn that such access might give Musk’s companies disproportionate insights into non-public contracting data and even help refine Grok itself for private gain. In theory, any AI model trained on confidential government datasets must navigate strict legal safeguards. Data-sharing protocols typically involve multiple sign-offs and oversight to prevent unauthorized disclosure. Through sidestepping those checks, DOGE risks exposing millions of Americans’ personal details, and handing xAI a trove of real-world information unavailable to competitors. DOGE insists its mission is to root out waste, fraud, and abuse. A DHS spokesperson told Reuters that DOGE never pressured staff to adopt any specific tool. “We are focused on efficiency,” the spokesperson said. But two sources counter that, over…

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Filed under: News - @ May 23, 2025 4:20 pm